The OffWhite Years
by Death's Apprentices
Summary: Once Aya figures out what it was to begin with, WAIT I GOT IT! Have you ever wondered how the Mabudachi Trio first met? C'mon, you know you have. Well, this is how we think it happened, and what elementary school was like. non yaoi.
1. Three Sohmas, One Classroom Poor Sensei

Disclaimer: Neither one of us owns Fruits Basket…much as we want to…it is owned by the great Natsuki Takaya.

The Off-White Years

By Death's Apprentices

Chapter 1

"Alright kids, settle down now!" Himura-sensei said to all the kindergartners running about the room.

They all immediately rushed to the giant rug for good spots, which ultimately ended up with five minutes of wrestling, spitting, and hair-pulling.

"Hey, Yahiko, don't kick Kurogane in the head!! Shigure, didn't I tell you not to pull on Emiko's hair!" Himura-sensei's patience was _really_ wearing thin by this point.

"Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Himura-sensei! Himura-sensei! Why's yer eye twitchin'?" A silver-haired feminine boy said to him, jumping up and down. "Why you snap the ruler in half? Why you grabbin' that sword? Why you glarin'? Why you eyes all gold 'n' stuff? Why-?"

"WILL YOU ALL JUST SHUT THE UP AND SIT YOUR ASSES DOWN!!!!!" Himura-sensei shouted, swinging a sakabato around and glaring at them all.

All the children immediately 'sat their asses down,' including the little silver-haired boy who looked ready to cry (along with most of the others).

They all heard a 'snap' sound and suddenly Himura-sensei had violet eyes again. He held up the sword and looked at it. "What was I saying?"

A little black-haired boy with pale eyes looked up from his coloring book. "Do you really want to know what you said?"

Himura-sensei blinked and sheathed the sakabato. "Probably not. MOVING ON THEN!" (All of the students jumped.) "Everyone sit down _quietly_ on the floor." He looked down at the students in front of him. "Oh…ok, then, you're all already there…ATTENDENCE! Akiko Yuri…Amato Saiyuki…" Two students raised their hands silently, scared that speaking would set off the scary teacher again. "Myojin Yahiko…Misuki Emiko…" Himura-sensei looked down the list and noticed that he had three Sohmas in his class. "Oh, thank god…At least I have 3 good children..." he muttered to himself before calling out the name of the first Sohma. "Sohma Ayame." The little silver-haired feminine boy who had driven the teacher into his little 'episode' raised his hand fearfully. "Shit," Sensei muttered. He was almost afraid to call on the next Sohma. "Sohma Hatori?" The little boy with the coloring book raised his hand without even looking up. _'One loud student, one quiet student; do I want to know what the third Sohma will be like?' _Sensei thought to himself. "Sohma Shigure?" The little boy who had been pulling Emiko's hair earlier raised his hand, smiling innocently. Himura covered his face with his hands. This was going to be a long year. Poor Himura-sensei.

RECESS

Young Hatori Sohma sat on a swing as far away from the group of girls as he could get. He was staring off into space while doodling aimlessly in the dirt with his foot when one to of the girls bounced over to him.

"Are you Hatori Sohma?" she asked, still bouncing on her toes.

"Yes," Hatori answered warily.

The girl turned around and yelled to one of the boys on the other side of the playground. "Gure! Gure! I found him! I found him! Come look! Come look!" the little boy came running over.

While Hatori was distracted watching his classmate almost fall over himself in his effort to run across the playground, the girl flew at him, arms wide. Taken by surprise, he ended up falling off the back of the swing, the girl on top of him. He closed his eyes, waiting for the inevitable screams…But they never came. Cautiously, he opened his eyes back up to find a pair of gold eyes and a pair of brown eyes staring back at him, concerned.

As Hatori lay there, blinking up at them, the boy playfully shoved the girl off him. "I told you not to scare him!" The boy held his hand out to Hatori. "I'm Shigure Sohma. He's Ayame Sohma." Shigure pointed to the girl on the ground after pulling Hatori up.

Hatori stared down at the girl. "That's a he? Are you sure?" He poked the kid, gaining a squeak.

"Yep, he's my cousin!" Shigure explained. He lowered his voice. "And if he was a girl, you could still hug him. He's the Snake. I'm the Dog," he said proudly. "Aren't you Dragon?"

"Do you want to be our friend?" Ayame asked, dusting himself off. When he looked back up at Hatori, there was a crazy gleam in his eyes.

Hatori tried to back away from the crazy-looking kindergartner only to find that Shigure had moved behind him. He was trapped. Poor Hatori.

PLEASE R&R!!!...or the shadow monster will attack you..


	2. Monopoly Money and Spit Balls

Thanks to all our reviewers!!!

Disclaimer: We do not own Fruits Basket or any other manga referenced in this story.

Chapter 2

Trapped. Trapped like a rat…er…like a dragon…Either way, Hatori was trapped in between Shigure and Ayame.

'_Oh! I know how to get out of this!_' Hatori thought. Slowly, so Ayame wouldn't jump him, he pulled 20 dollars out of his pocket.

"Hey, what cha doin'?" Ayame asked, cocking his head.

"I'll give you my money if you leave me alone…" Hatori said, showing them the money.

"Holy Labradoodle!! Twenty bucks!!" Shigure shouted, grabbing the money.

"Really?! We can get popsicles from the ice cream man now!!" Ayame glomped Shigure in his happiness.

"Are you kidding? We can BUY the ice cream truck!" Shigure said, doing a happy dance with Ayame.

Hatori took the chance and ran like the wind from his relatives, hoping he could hide before they found out he was gone.

Just when he dove behind a bush, he heard Ayame ask, "Hey, Gure? What's that word on the money?"

Shigure looked. He gasped. "THAT BUTT FACE GAVE US MONOPOLY MONEY!!!!!!"

Hatori jumped out of the buch and yelled, "I'm not a butt face, dog breath!!!!"

"Are too!!!" Shigure shouted.

"Am not!!" Hatori yelled. Ayame just loked back and forth between them.

"Are too!!

"Am not!!"

RECESS IS OVER!!!

"Am not!!" Hatori pointed at Shigure.

"Are too!!" Shigure pushed Hatori, who pushed him back.

Himura-sensei had stopped caring what they did a long time ago; as long as they didn't break any thing, he wasn't going to say anything. They wouldn't shut up, even after he went into Battosai mode. As it was, he was planning a _LOOOOOOONG_ vacation, maybe to Hawaii, or even Alaska.

Anyway, back to the fight.

"Am not!!" Hatori shoved Shigure into Kurogane's fort, knocking it over.

Shigure glared at Hatori and shoved him back with twice the force. "YES, YOU ARE!!!"

Unfortunately, Shigure hadn't known that Ayame was behind Hatori.

So, Hatori fell backwards into Ayame, making them both fall down really hard.

"YAY!! Hatori likes me!" Ayame yelled, squeezing Hatori in a bear hug.

"Can't…breathe!" Hatori whispered. Ayame loosened his grip, but still didn't' let go. Fortunately, for Hatori anyway, Ayame's grip was just loose enough for Hatori to squirm out and stand up…

Only to be tackled again by Shigure, argument forgotten. "YAY!! He likes us!"

Himura-sensei was fed up. He walked over and picked up Shigure before grabbing a fleeing Ayame. "Shigure, you go stand in that corner over by the window; Ayame, you go stand in the corner with the bookshelves. Hatori, you stand in the corner by my desk." Hatori stood up and stared defiantly at the teacher, but remained silent.

"Awwww!! But I don't wanna!!" Ayame started whining. He squirmed in Himura-sensei's grip…

And Himura snapped. This scene has been edited for violence toward small children In the end, Ayame and Shigure were crying in their corners; Hatori was glaring in his; and Himura-sensei was standing clueless in the center of the classroom, surrounded by a cloud of loose papers and open books.

Deciding he once again didn't want to know what had happened, Himura-sensei chose to move on with the lesson.

About five minutes into the lesson, a spit ball was seen flying toward Ayame's corner from Shigure's direction. Ayame, still crying, shot a teary-eyed glare at Shigure before launching a spit ball of his own. Unfortunately, Ayame's didn't quite make it all the way to Shigure's corner and ended up landing on Yahiko's head. Yahiko didn't seem to notice and class continued.

A few minutes later another spit ball was seen flying across the room from Shigure's corner, this one headed in Hatori's direction. Hatori sent a more effective glare than Ayame's before shooting his own spit ball. His spit ball actually hit Shigure, who let out a disgusted squeak before shooting back.

However, Himura-sensei had unwittingly stepped into the line of fire, and the spit ball meant for Hatori ended up smacking him on the side of his neck.

Shigure cowered in his corner when Himura-sensei leveled a glare at him that would have frozen a polar bear…Poor Shigure…

---------------------------------------------------------------------

Authors' Notes:

This fic will be temporarily discontinued, since we seem to be getting more high school ideas than elementary ones. So, we'll soon have a Mabudachi high school fic.


	3. Revenge

Disclaimer: We still do not own anything concerning Fruits Basket, or any other manga/book/anime/movie/other.

Chapter 3

It's been four days since Hatori, Shigure, and Ayame's first day of school. Since then, the trio had accumulated a total of 67 time-outs, including the 5 they had earned this morning. Just wait till the day's over…

Needless to say, Hatori, Shigure, and Ayame weren't exactly the best of friends.

But Hatori was planning to change than…at least for today. It was recess and Hatori was looking for Ayame and Shigure.

"Darn them both. They said they would come talk to me!!" Hatori grumbled, kicking a rock into a bush.

"OUCH!!!" Shigure shouted, jumping up and holding his head. "You did that on purpose, you butt-face!!"

"For the last time, I AM NOT A BUTT-FACE, YOU FLEA-INFESTED PUPPY!!" Hatori retorted.

Ayame gave Shigure a strange look. "You're infected? Ewww…" He moved to stand by Hatori so he wouldn't get infected either.

Hatori slapped his face with his hand. "He's not infected. And that's not why I told you to come over here anyways! I wanted to know if you wanted to help me get Himura-sensei back for giving us all those time-outs!"

"YES!" Ayame said.

"NO!!" Shigure said at the same time.

They stared at each other before walking away from Hatori and huddling together. He really couldn't make out what they were saying, but he caught a couple phrases.

"…and he's a zodiac, too! Plus, it sounds _fun_!!" Ayame was saying.

Shigure was quiet before whispering, "But, he's a butt-face…"

"NOT A BUTT-FACE!!!" Hatori yelled at them.

Aaya and Gure came back over to him. "We'll help," Ayame began, "but you guys gots to not fight. Yer yelling hurts my ears.'

Shigure and Hatori glared, when Shigure suddenly grinned. "Okay! But we gotta shake on it!"

Shigure then spat a bug lugie onto his hand and held it out for Hatori to shake. Aaya twitched and backed away from the spit, completely disgusted.

Hatori sighed, but he spat on his hand, too, and shook with Shigure.

"Ew, now you're both infectumacated!" Ayame said, grossed out. The other two laughed at him.

IN CLASS

"Alright, now who can tell me what 1+1 is? Kurogane!!" Himura-sensei called on the sleeping boy.

"FISH!!!" shouted Kurogane as he snapped awake.

"Uh…okay then. Close enough. The answer was two." Himura said, wondering exactly how you could confuse 'two' and 'fish'.

As Kenshin continued the lesson, Shigure yawned, stretched out his arm and oh-so-subtly whapped Ayame in the back of the head.

Ayame began to yell at him when he remembered that that was his signal to let Hatori know that they were about to begin _**the plan**_.

So Ayame turned around and began to marine-crawl back to where Hatori was.

"Okay, Gure-chan says it's time!" Aaya said cheerfully before he marine-crawled back to 'Gure-chan.'

Hatori smiled evilly, rubbing his hands together. That stupid carrot-topped, scar-faced, girly-man, Himura-sensei wouldn't know what hit him…

…Poor, poor Kenshin…

"Alright kids, let's move on to the alphabet!" Himura said, starting to draw an 'A' on the board.

Suddenly, someone started crying and screaming.

"_**WWWAAAAAAAHHHH**_!!!" Ayame wailed, bawling his eyes out. Shigure was standing above him, fists raised, looking like he was about to beat the crap out of Aaya.

"Wh-whoa!" Shigure! Don't hurt Ayame without a reason!" Himura-sensei said, rushing over to them when Gure kicked Ayame and made him bawl louder.

While Himura-sensei was distracted, Hatori bolted for the light switch and flicked the lights off.

"WOAH!" Himura-sensei said, dropping Shigure and Ayame from where he'd been holding them in the air. "Who turned out the freaking sun?"

If the sensei had been paying attention, he would have noticed that Ayame's crying and Shigure's threats had both stopped and now were replaced by evil giggling.

Eventually, and with much toe-stubbing and cursing, Himura-sensei found the switch and turned the lights back on.

"Well, that's better – HOLY SHIT!! When'd you get there?!" Himura jumped out of his skin when he turned around to find Ayame standing there grinning up at him.

"Jeez, you nearly gave me a heart attack…where did Shigure and Hatori go? And why are the other kids cowering in the corner?" Himura-sensei asked.

Ayame merely smiled, which was really starting to creep Himura out. Before he could say anything else, Hatori cracked him over the head with a wooden baseball bat (which broke).

The last thing Himura sensei saw was Aay , Tori, and Gure laughing like crack heads and grabbing a big sack. The last thing he heard was Shigure saying, "I still think you're a butt-face…"

((We're very tempted to leave it there))

((But, we won't…))

Himura-sensei awoke to the smell of fried chicken and the sound of his three least favorite students discussing what sounded suspiciously like his death.

"Do you think he's suffomacated yet?" He heard Ayame ask. He tried to open his eyes, only to find that it didn't help; he still couldn't see.

"I don't know, let me check." The fuzzy, chicken-smelling thing that was blocking his sight was removed, and he realized that it was a stuffed pink elephant. Looking past the elephant, Himura met Shigure's gaze for a brief instant before Shigure let out a squeak and stuffed the elephant back in place.

"Well?" Hatori asked impatiently. "Is he suffomacated or not?"

"He looked at me!!" Shigure shrieked, pushing down on the pink elephant. "We need more stuffies!"

"Dog-breath is right." Hatori spoke over Shigure's protest, saying, "Ayame, what do you have at your house?"

"Ummm…I have some giant teddy bears I won at the fair, and some really loooooong snakes, and some froggies, and some turtles, and -"

"Okay, okay; that'll work; shut up!" go get them! Dog-face, help him! I'll keep an eye on the prisoner." Hatori let out what was supposed to be an evil-sounding laugh, but ended up sounding really weird with his 5-year-old's voice.

"Hey! I do not have a dog-face!" Shigure whined.

Ayame started dragging Shigure away before they could start _that_ argument again. "Come on, Gure-chan."

As soon as he heard the click of the door closing, Himura-sensei started struggling to get out of his stuffed animal prison. Once he had finally freed himself, he looked around for the exit.

As he started for the door in the corner of the room, he noticed the absence of his 'guard,' Hatori…

His thoughts didn't get much further before a wooden baseball bat connected with his skull…again.

This time he woke up to the smell of hakubaiko and fried chicken. The hakubaiko invaded his memory and drove him slightly more insane each minute.

It only took a few minutes before he completely cracked and jumped out of the stuffed animal pile, screaming like a maniac. He then proceeded to make his own exit (through the wall) since Shigure and Ayame were standing in front of the only actual door.

…And so, Himura made his first semi-permanent 'visit' to an asylum.

A/N: Despite what we said in the last chapter, this popped into our heads and demanded to be written.


	4. Paint Wars and Sacrifices

Disclaimer: If you haven't figured out by now that we don't own anything that you recognize from anywhere else, you may feel free to take the bed next to poor Himura-sensei. Thank you for your time.

Chapter 4:

Kamiya Kaoru's classroom didn't look like any other classroom in the school. For one thing, it looked more like a dojo than a classroom. There were desks, and Kamiya-sensei herself had a desk at the front of the room, even a chalkboard. But there was a bloody shinai hanging above the chalkboard, and it was seriously starting to freak out her brand new first grade students.

Ayame turned to his cousin. "Shigure, how come all our teachers got swords?"

"I don't know, but I feel like we're going to die…" Shigure answered. Hatori, as usual, just shook his head at their idiocy.

After putting poor Himura-sensei in an asylum, the three had (sort of) become friends…sort of…a little…okay, not really. Tori and Gure still had issues, and Tori was still questioning Aaya's gender. But Ayame didn't care cause Aaya is Aaya like that. But they kind of tolerated each other enough to hang out.

Anyways…the bell rang and Kamiya-sensei still wasn't there.

Hatori rolled his eyes. "Great…We have the 'always-late' teacher." He sighed.

Suddenly, the door to the dojo/classroom was thrown open and Kamiya-sensei burst into the room.

"Sorry I'm late everyone!! I had to make lunch, and I nearly burned it and yeah," Kamiya-sensei explained. She went to her desk and grabbed the attendance sheet.

_This is great!_ Kaoru thought happily. _I have a nice, quiet class for once!! Yay for me!_

"Okay, when I call your name, raise your hand and say 'here'.

"Akiko Yuri…Amato Saiyuki." The girls said 'here' and raised their hands, happy that she wasn't like Himura-sensei. "Kurogane, Misuki Emiko…" They did the same. So far, the kids were happy. It looked like Kaoru wasn't the type of person to use a bloody shinai on them. "Myojin Yahiko…Oh! Yahiko! I've been looking for you! Why weren't you at the dojo yesterday?!"

"I'll come when I want to, Ugly!!" Yahiko shouted at the teacher.

"You pointy-eyed midget!!" Kamiya-sensei exclaimed.

"Better a pointy-eyed midget than am ugly girl who can't cook!!"

Kamiya-sensei popped a blood vessel. She grabbed her shinai and in a flash, cracked Yahiko on the head making blood spurt everywhere and Yahiko fall unconscious.

The students stared in horror at the teacher. Then they each thought, _It's a girl Himura-sensei!!!_

Kaoru replaced the shinai and was al smiles and sunshine again. "Okay, moving on! Sohma Ayame, Sohma Hatori, and Sohma Shigure!"

Ayame, scared to death, raised his hand and answered shakily. Even Hatori was a tiny bit freaked, but he was good at hiding it. Shigure answered cheerfully, "Here, Kamiya-sensei! And Kamiya-sensei? Yahiko's wrong; I think you're pretty…" ((and pervy Gure was born…))

Shigure was hoping to get on Kaoru's good side, and apparently it worked.

"Aw, thank you! You get a gold star!" Kamiya-sensei stuck a gold-star sticker to Shigure's forehead.

Shigure grinned and gave a thumbs-up to Aaya. "All right!" ((and so that tradition is born…))

Kamiya-sensei began to bring out paper and paint. "Alright class! I want to know a little more about you ass, so we're going to have fun. I want everyone to fingerpaint your favorite animal! Have fun!"

And so the students set about painting their various animals. Five minutes into arts and crafts, Shigure looked over at Ayame's picture.

"What is that supposed to be?" Shigure pointed at Ayame's painting, laughing.

Ayame jerked his had, smearing pink paint all over his picture. "Nothing!" he looked back at his picture, then added more pink until the entire piece of paper was a blinding shade of pink. "I'm gonna make an elephant!...but I don't think the paper's big enough…Oh, I know! I'll use the wall!" So saying, Ayame proceeded to paint a giant pink elephant on the wall.

"…Your elephant sucks monkeys!" Shiguer said after a few minutes of watching Ayame paint.

"So! Your dog sucks worse!" Ayame flicked his paint brush towards Shigure's paper, but missed and ended up hitting Shigure with a glob of hot pink paint.

Shigure stood gaping in shock for a minute before screaming, "Oh, no you di-en't!!" and flinging day-glow orange paint at Ayame. Unfortunately, for Hatori anyway, the paint missed Ayame and hit Hatori's butt.

Hatori turned around slowly to glare at Ayame and Shigure. Not really caring who he hit, he flung the contents of the black paint jar in the general direction of his tow cousins. He turned around before the paint hit.

The good news was that he did hit who he was aiming for; the bad news was that he also hit the two most hot-headed students in the class: Kurogane and Yahiko…

And so the first paint war began.

A few minutes into the paint war, Kamiya-sensei, who had stepped out of the room to talk to another teacher, walked back in with her head still turned towards Sagara-sensei. A glob of indigo paint smacked into the side of her face…

The room fell silent as Kamiya-sensei slowly turned towards the students ……………….

……………………………………………………………

"ALRIGHT!! WHO JUST THREW FRICKIN **PAINT** AT ME?!?!" Kaoru screeched, blasting the eardrums of her students.

Hatori pointed at Shigure; Shigure pointed at Hatori; Kurogane pointed at Yahiko pointed at Saiyuki; Saiyuki pointed at Yuri; Yuri pointed at Emiko; Emiko pointed at Ayame; Ayame pointed up.

Both Gure and Tori gave Aaya a look. "Doofus," they both said.

Kamiya-sensei, who was seething with rage and breathing fire, snatched the bloody shinai from above the chalkboard and stomped over to them.

"If you don't tell me, I'll punish you all!!!" Kamiya-sensei threatened.

Emiko looked concerned. "You can't hit me, I'm a girl! You'll go to jail!!"

Shigure tapped her on the shoulder. "You know that only works if the one hitting you is a guy, right?"

Emiko was silent, then kicked and glared at the ground. "Drat…"

They all remembered Kamiya-sensei was out to kill, and went back to being scared.

Kaoru towered over them. "I'm giving you to the count of FIVE. One…"

The class started to panic. Nobody remembered who's been painting with what color anymore.

"Two…"

Suddenly, Hatori got an idea. It was so simple, so PERFECT, SO GENIUS!!

"Three…"

He leaned over and told Shigure his brilliant plan. Shigure slapped himself in the face, wondering why _he_ hadn't thought of that.

"_Four_…"

Hatori and Shigure snuck over behind one of their classmates, silent as a constipated ninja.

"FOUR AND A _**HALF**_…!!"

Ayame looked around, wondering how the hell his cousins had disappeared into thin air.

"FIV—"

"**HE DID IT!!!!**" The two Sohma boys shouted, shoving Yahiko out of the group and to Kamiya-sensei.

"What? No! They lie!" Yahiko cried.

Ayame burst into tears. "H-he said (hic) that he'd – that he's hu-urt us if we t-told!!" Ayame sobbed, hugging Gure and Tori.

Emiko joined in. "HE SAID HE'D CUT OFF OUR HAIR AND BURY OUR DOLLIES IN THE SANDBOX!!!" And with that, the girls all burst into tear.

Kamiya-sensei gasped. "Yahiko, you little urchin-head, how could you say that to them?! That's it; I'm taking you to see Principal Creed!!"

"What?" Yahiko exclaimed. Kaoru grabbed him by the collar and began to drag him away. "YOU DIRT SONS OF –"

"PROTECT THE VIRGIN EARS!!!" Kaoru yelled, knocking Yahiko unconscious with the shinai and dragging him into the hallway.

The class was silent, staring at the door.

"So…what now?" The other girl, Yuri asked.

Shigure and Aaya shared a look and grinned madly. "Arriiibaa!!!"

Ayame pulled a sombrero out of nowhere, put it on the ground, and they both danced around it.

The girls pulled out maracas and took the role of mariachi band.

Hatori and Kurogane stood off to the side, wondering what the bloody hell they did in past lives to deserve freakish classmates like these.

A/N: Wow...longest chapter yet!!! They just keep getting longer and longer...We still can't belive that we made it whtis far...YAY!!


	5. Is Ayame really a guy? Part 1

Disclaimer: At this point, you really need help if you still think we own the rights to any of the works used in this story.

Chapter 5:

Day 73 of Kamiya-sensei's torment from the three Sohma boys.

_I don't _think_ the assignment 'bring your favorite book from home' can be messed up too bad_, Kamiya-sensei thought to herself. Isn't it amazing how wrong a teacher can be? "So what did you bring, Yuri?"

"I brought The Cat in the Hat!" the small girl in the front row said, excited.

"Hey! That's what I brought!" several voices around the room protested.

"Okay…raise your hand if you didn't bring something by Dr. Seuss," Kamiya-sensei said over the chattering students. Five hands rose into the air: the three Sohmas, Yahiko, and Kurogane. "What did you bring, Yahiko? And if you got it from my room, you'll have to scrub the dojo until I see my reflection in the floor!"

Yahiko slowly lowered his hand and slid his book under the table. "Nevermind."

Kamiya blinked. "Well then, what did you bring, Kurogane?"

Kurogane silently held up his book, How to Drink Sake Like a Man.

Kamiya-sensei blinked. Well…okay then. And where did you find that book?"

"My dad gave it to me," Kurogane said proudly.

She nodded then turned to face the three Sohmas. "Do I dare ask what you brought, Shigure?"

Shigure held a magazine over his head. "I brought Penth-ouse Forum! Oh, and I found it under Daddy's bed when he wasn't looking."

Hatori silently glared at the teacher for a minute before raising a plain black book with the words "Gray's Anatomy" embossed on the cover.

Kaoru stood gobsmacked, wondering where the HELL a first grader got an anatomy book. She was a little too scared to ask though, so she chose to again move on. "Ayame? What did you bring?"

Ayame started bouncing excitedly in his seat, clapping. "I brought COSMOPOLITAN!!"

Kaoru sighed in relief. "Well, it's perfectly fine for a girl to have that…but it's not exactly a book."

"Aww…really? Cuz I asked my mo and she said—" Ayame stopped, mind-rant, and slowly looked at Kamiya-sensei. "Did you just call me a girl?"

Kamiya-sensei cocked her head to the side. "Well, you are, aren't you? I mean, you've got long hair, you act girly, you brought a fashion magazine, and Ayame is a girl's name."

Shigure giggle madly with Kurogane, and Hatori turned to Aaya. "You know, she brings up some good points…"

Ayame opened his mouth to argue, but then he closed it. After a second, he opened his mouth but again, no sound came out. Since he couldn't argue any of those facts, Aaya sat on the ground and pouted.

Kamiya-sensei cleared her throat. "Well then, today I want you all to make posters for Halloween! You know where all the markers and crayons are, so get started!"

"YAY!!" Aaya, along with the other girls, exclaimed. He then ran to get pink, yellow, orange, and purple markers.

Shigure, who had green, orange, and black markers, looked at Ayame's poster. It had the word "Halloween" with hearts, stars, smiley faces, a purple snake, and a pink bat surrounding it.

"Uh…you know Halloween is supposed to be scary, right?" Shigure asked.

"Yeah, but I want my poster to be pretty!" Aaya answered.

Hatori looked up from his evil, gory, black and red poster. "Which proves again that you're a girl."

Ayame turned to stone on the spot.

Shigure poked the stone Aaya. "Hey! Wakey-wakey! Tofu eggs and bacon…ey!"

Ayame went back to normal and stuck out his tongue. "Ew! You know I don't like bacon!"

Hatori, Yahiko, and Kurogane all gasped in shock.

"That proves it!! You really are a girl!!!" Kurogane exclaimed, pointing at Aaya with a horrified face.

Ayame popped about a thousand blood vessels in that instant. (THAT can't be healthy.)

"What's it going to take to make you believe I'm a boy?!?!" Ayame shouted at them.

Hatori, Kurogane, and Yahiko huddled together for a minute, then decided on something.

"DO SOMETHING MANLY!!!" They shouted.

Ayame's eyes narrowed and his face became serious. He nodded once. "I'll do it."

Shigure smiled worriedly. "This could end _very_ badly…"

Ayame ignored Shigure's small warning, giving his poster to the girls and sprinting around the room once before huddling in the corner.

"Yeah, this is gonna be bad," Shigure said again when he noticed an empty drawer labeled 'Permanent Markers.'

Hatori looked around and noticed something missing from the teacher's desk."

"Hey, where did the BIG Scissors go?"

Authors' notes: Do not blame us for the cliff hanger; we took a (sort of) poll with our friends and they said leave it here. Enjoy!!


	6. Is Ayame really a guy? Part 2

Disclaimer: Yeah, if you still think we own any of the characters used in this fic, you need professional help.

Chapter 6

While his classmates drew posters, Ayame sat in the darkest corner of the classroom, hidden by a giant globe.

"Something manly, huh?" Ayame muttered, looking at his supplies. "I'll give 'em something manly…"

Laid out before him, Ayame had about 20 permanent markers, Kurogane's How to Drink Sake Like a Man book, Kamiya-sensei's BIG scissors, a small mirror, a bottle of glue, and Shigure's dad's "Pen-thouse Forum" magazine.

He took the scissors in one hand and the mirror in the other. "Goodbye old Aaya, hello MANLY AAYA!!" And he began his transformation.

Kamiya-sensei felt like dancing, she was so happy right now.

_I am so proud of myself! The only thing that's gone wrong today was Shigure bringing his dad's porn!_ Kamiya-sensei thought. _And no one has screwed up the Halloween poster project—Wait a sec…_

Kamiya-sensei turned away from her desk and faced the class. "Alright! Who's the one that took my BIG scissors?!"

So much for a perfect, no-screw-up, day.

All the kids looked at each other, then to her. They all shrugged and went back to making posters.

Kamiya-sensei glared at them all, then realized she was missing a student. She went back to her desk and checked the attendance sheet; no absent students there. She looked at the students again and saw that it was Sohma Ayame that was missing.

"Shigure, Hatori!" Kamiya-sensei shouted. "Where's your cousin?"

Both boys shrugged. "Last I saw, he was stealing your skissers and the perminant markers," Hatori said before he went back to his poster.

Kmiya-sensei finally noticed the empty permanent marker drawer and sand down into her chair. She dropped her face into her hands and sighed. "Why…WHY and I being tortured so?..."

Suddenly the lunch bell rang.

"Okay, kids! Stop your posters and have some lunch." Kamiy-sensei sighed defeatedly.

The kids cheered and pulled out their lunches and ate like starving, rabid animals.

Hatori and Shigure sat farthest away from the girls as possible. "Where do you think he went—Shigure are you eating glue…?" Hatori asked.

Shigure swallowed and grinned a gluey grin. "Yup! It's yummy! Want some?" he shoved it in Hatori's face.

"Uh…no thanks…" Hatori said. Then he noticed that someone was standing behind Shigure. "Oh, hey Ayam—**OH MY GAWD** WHAT HAPPENED TO YOU?!?!" Hatori screamed, looking at Aaya with a horrified face.

Shigure turned around to see what had freaked out Hatori. "Huh? What's going on?...AYAME!!! WHAT THE HECK IS ON YOUR **FACE**?!?

Well, Ayame had certainly transformed himself…Ayame had cut off most of his hair so that is resembled Yahiko's spiky, urchin hair, sticking out in all directions. He'd also used the permanent markers to color the ends of his hair black, and used glue to spike it up. He was holding 'Penthouse Forum' and How to Drink Sake Like a Man in one hand and a sake bottle filled with milk in the other. But the thing that really freaked out Shigure and Hatori? Ayame had used the permanent markers to draw big, fat uber-caterpillar eyebrows (much like Rock Lee's) on his face, and Ayame had drawn himself a goatee on his face (and a very bad one at that).

"WHO'S MANLY NOW?!" Ayame shouted, grinning like a monkey with an armada full of bananas. He took a swig of milk and belched loudly in Shigure's face.

Shigure fell out of his chair at the stench of rotten tuna fish mixed with milk.

Kamiya-sensei came up behind Ayame to check on Shigure. When she looked at Ayame, she said, I didn't know we were getting a new student! You can call me Kami—wait a minute…" She looked closer. "AYAME?!?! WHAT DID YOU DO TO YOURSELF?! ...And how did you get my BIG scissors and all the permanent markers without me noticing?"

"Do you like it? I'm MANLY AAYA now!!" Ayame took a swig from the sake bottle and belched again, knocking the newly-recovered Shigure back onto the floor.

Hatori shook his head, hiding his grin behind his hand, and decided he might be at least a little safer (at least from being fallen on by Shigure or Kamiya-sensei) eating his lunch over by Yahiko and Kurogane.

As Kaoru went to the bathroom to get some wet paper towels to attempt to wash the permanent marker off Ayame's face (despite his protests), the rest of the students chose to start hanging up their Halloween decorations. The only problem was that no one could reach the shelf on which the teacher kept the tape…

Not to be discouraged, the children decided to hang their posters with the one adhesive material they had: glue.

When Kaoru returned with a (sort of) squeaky clean Ayame, the room looked like a black and white murder scene; the entire room was dripping with white liquid, students covered in the same white substance were lying in various positions on the floor around the room.

Kamiya-sensei slowly backed out of the room, took a few deep breaths, and walked back in with her eyes closed, hoping that she had just been seeing things the first time. When she opened her eyes the room itself hadn't changed; however, none of the students could be found, even Ayame had disappeared.

"Oh shit…" Kamiya-sensei muttered, looking around fearfully. She was on the verge of a panic attack when…

"One, two, Freddy's comin for you. Three, four, better shut the door…" Kamiya-sensei heard a child singing in a creepy voice. "Five, six, get a crucifix. Seven, eight, it's too late. Nine, ten, never sleep again…"

"EEEEEEEEEEEECCCKKKK!!!!!" Kamiya-sensei shrieked. "THEY'RE COMING TO STEAL MY SOUL!!!!" Kaoru dashed out of the room, screaming some nonsense about a place called Elm Street and a man with steel claws.

Ayame giggled, coming out from under the teacher's desk.

"That was fun! Now, where'd she put those markers…?" Aaya wondered, glancing around the glue-covered room.

"AYAME!" a voice from above exclaimed.

"Ayame glanced about wildly. "Oh my god it's…GOD!!!" He got on his knees, bowing with his face to the ground. "I AM NOT WORHTY, O GREAT ONE!!!"

"…It's Hatori, you airhead…" Hatori said from his place on the ceiling.

Aaya got up, looked up, and found himself staring at the entire class (who had been covered in glue), stuck to the ceiling.

"WOOOW!!" Ayame 'wowed'. "How'd ya get up there?"

Indeed the entire class was stuck on the ceiling in many various positions. It just so happened that Hatori was stuck in the process of punching Shigure, only his fist stopped inches from the dog's face. Shigure was stuck cowering in fear.

"Shigure" (insert death glare) "convinced everyone to be ninjas and climb on the ceiling, and dragged me up here," Hatori said, clearly struggling in an attempt to hit Shigure.

Aaya noticed the struggle. "Want I should throw something at him?"

"Yes, please."

A chalk eraser flew at Shigure, bonking him on the head. "OUCH!!"

"Thanks," Hatori said. "Now go and get help!!"

"Ok! Be right back, Tori-san!" Aaya said, skipping out of the room.

-------1 HOUR LATER-------

Kurogane, who was stuck on his head, looked at the door. "He's not coming back is he?"

"Nope," Shigure answered.

Hatori's fist was shaking spasmodically, and he was grunting with the effort to move it. (very strong glue)

"HA!" he exclaimed in triumph. "I MOVED! MUAHAHA!! BE AFRAID, CAUSE I'M NEARLY THERE!" He them resumed attempting to move his fist.

Shigure blinked, then glanced down. "I…I thing I just wet myself…"

Now it was Hatori's turn to blink. "I didn't need to know that..."

And what of Kamiya-sensei, you ask? Well, the next day, she was found huddled in a corner of a janitor's closet, mumbling things along the lines of 'they're coming' and 'steal my soul.' And for some reason, 'S-so much GLUE…!!' Then she was sent to an asylum.

And Ayame? He simply went home where it's safe and glue-free and took a nice nap.

---------------

This chapter has been brought to you by Elmer's Glue.


	7. April Fools

April Fools

April Fools

It was the day before second grade started and Hatori was quietly sitting eating his lunch when a bag was thrown over his head while Ayame and Shigure screamed, "APRIL FOOLS!!" and laughed like the maniacs that they are.

Hatori jerked the bag off and glared at his two cousins. "It's August, you idiots! You're eight months early! Come back later." He turned back to his lunch and ignored Shigure and Ayame.

Ayame burst into tears. "He doesn't love us anymore! He hates us!! HE HATES US!! WAAAH!!"

Shigure pat Aaya on the back comfortingly. "It's okay. He can't ignore us forever. Remember, Aaya, we're in the same class! We'll get him all to ourselves tomorrow!!" he said with an evil grin. In his seat, Hatori cringed.

A/N: Don't worry; you'll get a real chapter tomorrow. We just had to throw this in for fun.


	8. Aliens and Pink Duct Tape

Disclaimer: I'm not even gonna say it anymore. Instead, here is a brief glimpse into the lives of Death's Apprentices:

Aaya: (trying to sneak up on Tori, who is reading her newest manga)

Tori: (without looking up from book) Hi Aaya. What do you want this time?

Aaya: Curse you! I was going to steal a dollar so I can get some apple juice!

Tori: No.

Aaya: (pouts) Awwww...But I was gonna use it to torment Sam and Justin...

Tori: (pulls dollar out of wallet and hands it to Aaya) Here ya go. Have fun! (turns back to book)

Aaya: (takes dollar and runs, screaming) YAAAAY!!

Chapter Seven

Hatori sighed as his father drove him to school. Today was his first day of second grade, and he was absolutely positive that something was going to go wrong.

When he thought about how kindergarten and first grade had turned out he sighed again.

_How did I get mixed up with those two…?_ He thought, Ayame and Shigure's idiotic faces popping into his mind. For some reason, he imagined them both outside the car window, grinning like goofs and waving madly.

Hatori blinked. He rubbed his eyes and looked out the window again.

Crap.

Poor, poor Hatori… Ayame and Shigure really were outside the window, in the car alongside his father's. Hatori groaned and sank down in his seat so far even Shigure and Aaya couldn't see him anymore.

Hatori's father heard his son and glanced in the rear-view mirror. "What's the matter? Are you sick?"

Hatori just raised an eyebrow, deciding he didn't want to know what was wrong with his son.

_Today's going to be bad…_ Hatori thought ominously. Oh, how right he was…

IN CLASS

"How come you didn't wave Hi, Tori-san?!" Ayame demanded. "Did you not see us?"

Shigure answered for him. "Nah, he just hates us to death."

Before Hatori could even say anything, Ayame broke down crying. "WAAH! Hatori HATES ME!!"

Hatori sighed for what seemed to be the millionth time that morning, before glaring at Shigure. He patted Ayame on the head. "I don't hate you…"

"HE LIKES ME!" All smiles again, he glomped Tori.

Hatori pried him off. "…I just tolerate you…"

Ayame shrugged. "I can live with that."

Shigure cocked his head. "You can be rally fickle, you know that?"

"So what? You trying to—Hey, what's he doing?!" Aaya pointed at someone behind the other two.

"…and ADD…" Shigure added. Hatori agreed before they both turned to see what had captured their friend's spastic attention.

Apparently, one of their classmates (Kurogane) had noticed the huge, oversized sword hanging over the chalkboard. Currently he was trying to get it down using the infallible method of jumping up and down and reaching for it.

Yuri watched Kurogane bounce around like Ayame for at least five full minutes before simply pulling over the (absent) teacher's chair, climbing up on it, and grabbing the giant thing. She then carefully got back off the chair and held it out to Kurogane. "Here you go, stupid-brain."

Kurogane tried to snatch the oversized sword from her hands, but ended up knocking it into the teacher's desk, breaking both the sword and the desk.

All the students froze…Well, all except for Ayame, who was suddenly digging around in his book bag. After the initial shock, Hatori looked over at this cousin. "What are you doing?"

"I'm looking for my duct tape!" Ayame replied. "Ha! Found it!" He jerked up, holding a roll of pink duct tape.

Hatori and Kurogane both blinked, considering the possibilities of pink duct tape. Hatori's mind was turning over the idea of tying up his cousins and taping their mouths shut, then leaving. Kurogane was wondering just how long it would take the teacher to notice the pink patch wrapped around the middle of his sword.

Neither one got very far with their thoughts before a loud ripping noise broke the silence as Ayame pulled off a long strip of tape. Apparently, his thoughts were following a similar path as Kurogane's; he was slowly walking toward Kurogane and the broken sword, holding out the strip of duct tape...

…Footsteps were suddenly heard approaching the classroom…

Again, all the students froze for an instant before the classroom erupted into frenzy. Kurogane, Ayame, and Shigure frantically started wrapping duct tape around the giant sword while Yahiko and Hatori held the two pieces together.

"Hurry up! He's coming!" Hatori said.

"QUIT RUSHIN US!!" Aaya snapped, semi-tangled in pink tape. Hatori blinked, then smacked his femme cousin in the head.

"Don't snap at me."

Sagara Sanosuke was right outside the door to his classroom, yelling at a janitor who was riding he floor buffer up and down the halls, while shouting, "Tequila" and humming a tune to himself.

"Next time you bring in booze, share it, you selfish bastard!" Sano shouted angrily. He opened the door to his classroom and was met by a rather strange sight.

The first thing he noticed was that his desk was _broken_. Like split-in-half broken. The second thing was that half his students were on each side of the desk, holding it together, while on top of the desk were Shigure and Ayame Sohma (who were, by now, famous among the teachers) were passing the tape around and under the desk to Hatori Sohma and Kurogane. They were trying to wrap the tape around the broken halves, to 'fix it'.

"WHAT THE HELL?!" Sanosuke hollered, making the kids jump.

All of the children who had been holding the desk together tripped over themselves as they ran to their seats. Only the Sohma boys and Kurogane were left near the desk.

"They did it!" the class chorused, pointing at the boys.

Sano-sensei was shaking with rage. "You four!!" He pointed at Kurogane and the famous Sohmas. "Get to a corner, **NOW!!**"

Ayame and Shigure attempted to follow Hatori to a corner. Sanosuke grabbed them by their collars and shoved them separate ways. "_Separate_ corners!"

Although they were in completely opposite corners, Hatori somehow managed to glare at both of his cousins at the same time. Both Ayame and Shigure noticed his glare, but after a few minutes, Ayame's ADD kicked in, and Shigure got bored with the 'staring contest.'

Pulling 2 permanent markers out of who-knows-where, Ayame tossed one across the room, hitting Shigure in the head and started drawing bunnies on the wall with the other.

After figuring out what had hit him, Shigure pulled off the cap of his marker and starting sniffing it and twitching.

Unfortunately, for Shigure, Sano-sensei noticed Shigure twitching, calmly walked over to him, stole the marker, and walked away. Shigure hardly noticed, however, because he had just figured out what Ayame was drawing on the wall and couldn't stop the maniacal laughter.

Ayame had drawn a black-and-white dripping sakabato and had just moved on to writing 'Himura was here!' in demonic writing.

When lunch-time came, Ayame (who had hidden his doodles behind the xylophone), Shigure, Hatori, and Kurogane were released from their corners. While the kids were eating, Sanosuke thought it would be fun to …'entertain'… them with some xylophone music.

After the third mallet broke, Sanosuke gave up and wheeled the xylophone back to the corner. He saw the sakabato and words written in the corner. It took a second or two for the words to really sink in, but when they did, Sano went berserk.

He ran back to the front of the room to grab his zanbato (he didn't notice the pink duct tape around the middle) and charged toward the corner with the drawings, screaming, "RUN AWAY, KIDS!! HE'S OUT OF THE ASYLUM!!"

About halfway across the room, he noticed the duct tape and froze mid-air. Unfortunately, the top half of the zanbato kept going, breaking off from the duct-taped bottom half, and smashing the xylophone.

Sanosuke stared unblinkingly at the broken zanbato in his hands, then at the other half on top of his demolished xylophone.

Without warning, he threw the half he had out the window, effectively smashing the glass to little bite-size pieces. "SHINY!!" Ayame exclaimed.

Sano bopped him on the head and turned to the rest of the class. "OKAY, YOU LITTLE SONS OF BI—I mean FEMALE DOGS!!"

At this, Shigure stood up. "I resent that! My momma is a human!"

"Sit down!" And Shigure did." I want to know WHO BROKE MY ZANBATO AND THEN USED PINK DUCT TAPE TO FIX IT?!"

All of the children were silent, scared to death of Sano's outburst. Aaya was hugging Shigure for dear life, and Shigure had jumped onto Hatori, so now poor little Hatori was stuck holding both of his cousins. Kurogane whistled a tune while managing to pull off an innocent look, while Yahiko quickly learned how to whistle so he could do the same.

Sanosuke was about to start yelling again, when he stopped himself, remembering everything he learned from his anger management classes. So, he began to slowly count to 100 in Gaelic…

This thoroughly confused the poor second graders, who were thinking that their sensei was either crazy or an alien…and they were leaning toward the latter.

Little Saiyuki whispered to her classmates, "I saw a movie about aliens once! They talked just like sensei!!"

"What did the aliens in the movie do?" Shigure asked cautiously. He and Hatori were some of the few who didn't think Sanosuke was an alien.

"They tried to kill all the people and eat them!" came her cheerful reply.

"He's gonna eat us!" Ayame and Emiko exclaimed simultaneously. Hatori and Kurogane quickly shut them up before they attracted Sano-sensei's attention.

"Wait, maybe it was the movie with the zombies that they ate all the people…" Saiyuki added as an afterthought.

Yahiko gaped at her. "Now he's a zombie alien?" he asked incredulously.

Hatori gave him an utterly serious look. "Yes, he is. And he's going to kill us and eat our brains, and it's all Kurogane's fault."

"A seacht déag, a hocht déag, a naoi déag, fiche…" Sanosuke paused in his count upon hearing Hatori laying the blame on Kurogane. He turned to the accused and pointed a threatening finger. "It was you!! YOU DID THIS TO MY ZANBATO!!"

"WHAT?!" Kurogane exclaimed. He scowled at Hatori, then turned to Sagara-sensei. "I don't even own pink duct tape. Check my bag for yourself!"

He gave his backpack to Sanosuke thinking there wouldn't be anything remotely girly inside it.

So, when Sano pulled out Ayame's roll of hot pink duct tape and one of Ayame's fashion magazines, his jaw hit the floor.

Shigure began to laugh as Ayame attempted to whistle and appear innocent of putting his things in Kurogane's bag. Even Hatori was shaking with concealed laughter.

Sanosuke cleared his throat. "Well then…now that we all know that Kurogane is in denial of being just like Ayame…" He looked pointedly at the fashion magazines. Then he pointed at Kurogane and glared. "OFF TO PRINCIPAL CREED WITH YOU!!"

All the children gasped and ran for a place to hide. Hatori had hidden under a desk, which had been cramped enough alone, when Shigure and Ayame decided to squish themselves under there with him.

Suddenly, the door to the room crashed open and there stood Principal Creed in all his glory, wearing a long, leopard-print coat, shiny gold pants, and a frilly white 70's shirt.

"OH MY GAWD! IT'S A REAL ALIEN!!" Saiyuki exclaimed, doing a happy dance.

Principal Creed stared at her and muttered something along the line of Frosted Flakes being made of pure crack and that it should be considered an illegal drug and that kids are lucky they get it for breakfast. Then he turned his attention to Kurogane. "Well, young man, I HAVE COME TO TAKE YOU TO MY OFFICE!! MUAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!" He grabbed Kurogane and whooshed out of the room.

Shigure shook his head sadly. "He's taken another one…"

"Yeah, too bad for him. Now let's get out from under this—" Hatori stopped when he noticed that, somehow, someway, Ayame had found a way to duct tape all the opening of the desk shut, thereby trapping them all inside.

Hatori turned his head slowly to glare at Aaya, who simply smile and waved.

"Look on the bright side!" Ayame exclaimed. "We don't have to learn no more, and none of us are claustero…causeto…closetro…"

"Claustrophobic?" Hatori filled in. Ayame nodded. Then Shigure shyly raised a hand.

"Um, actually…" Gure said before going into a small panic attack from being in a closed space.

While Ayame tried to calm down Shiguer, Hatori dropped his head into his hands. Then he raised his head, looked around him and shrugged.

"Well, today wasn't as bad as I thought it would be," Hatori said.


	9. Not another one!

Disclaimer: I'm sick of saying it, so I' just gonna use this space to answer some questions.

ayafangirl - 'Creed' is from the manga/anime Black Cat.

Strangely enough, that's all the questions we have, but feel free to ask anything you want, or submit ideas for future chapters! We are slowly running out of pranks and plotlines, so help is very much appreciated!

...oh, and Death-Aaya says 'HI!!'

Chapter 8:

"**BAM! I'M CONSIDERED!**" Hatori woke with a start as those words ran through his semi-conscious mind. He looked at his alarm clock, which read 2:18 a.m., and slumped back down under his blanket. It was going to be one of _those_ days.

When he woke up again, this time to the sound of someone pounding on his door, he felt an unexplainable urge to go find Ren and hug her stomach. After getting dressed, he opened the door to find Ayame and Shigure staring at him with tear-streaked faces. He touched his own cheek and was surprised to feel wetness there, too.

"You, too, huh?" Shigure asked quietly. Hatori nodded. "Well, then, let's go find her!" Together, they began a search of the entire Sohma estate. They eventually found Ren in an inner courtyard and ran to her, crying openly now.

As they reached her, another boy about their age emerged from the other side of the courtyard. He, too, appeared to be crying.

With all four crying boys locked around her waist, Ren became angry and confused. When yelling at them to get of didn't work, she wriggled herself loose and ran off, screaming at servants to take the children back where they were supposed to be.

A couple of female servants came to Ren's call and ushered the crying children back to the yard of Shigure's house, since his home was the farthest from Ren's.

After a few more minutes of silent sobbing and hugging one another for comfort, the boys calmed down and let go of each other.

Ayame sniffled and turned to the other kid with the trio. "Hey, you're Kureno, right?"

The little brown-haired boy nodded, wiping his nose on his sleeve. "Did…Did you all have that dream, too?" he asked, hesitant.

The trio nodded.

The four were silent for a while as each thought about their dreams and the urges they'd had to hug Ren's tummy.

"So, Kureno, why don't you come to our school? I mean, we're all the same age, aren't we?" Shigure asked, clearing his throat and changing the subject.

"Actually my parents are going to start sending me to your school tomorrow. They told me so yesterday," he answered after wiping his nose again.

"Yay! That means you might be in our class!" Ayame said as he jumped up and down. He was glad for the subject change.

Hatori remained quiet, but inside his head, he was horrified. _No…NO!! Not another one!_

--The Next Day--

Sagara-sensei burst through his classroom door just as the bell rang. "Alright, munchkins, settle down and get to your seats!"

He glared at Ayame, who stayed sitting on Shigure's desk. "That means you, too, Sohma."

Ayame sat down in his seat while Hatori and Shigure said, "I am in my seat!"

Sano smacked his forehead, exasperated. "You know what I meant! Anyways, you all have a new classmate today, so make him fell welcome." He motioned to someone outside the door. "Come on in, kid."

Unsurprisingly to the trio, Kureno walked shyly in to the room.

"Hello. My name is Sohma Kureno." He bowed to the class, who said "Hi" back.

Sano-sensei snapped to attention. "Sohma? You're a SOHMA?!" he yelled, panicking.

Kureno nodded hesitantly, wide-eyed.

Sanosuke dropped to his knees and buried his face in his hands. "NOT ANOTHER ONE!!" His voice was filled with pure, unadulterated horror.

While Ayame and Shigure accused the sensei of being racist, Hatori thought, _At least I'm not the only one who thinks so…_

After a few minutes sobbing and cursing the gods, and having apiece of ceiling fall on him as karma, Sano-sensei stood up and acted like nothing happened.

"Oh, yeah! Before I forget, Kurogane is coming back from his punishment with Principal Creed today, so try not to ask him about it and make him have violent flashbacks or anything," Sano said.

Almost immediately after he finished speaking, Creed pranced into the room, scary outfit and all, carrying a large, fluffy pink (and moving) sack. He put it on the ground and pranced back out.

Hatori raised his hand. "How did he get the job as principal?"

Sano sighed, opening the sack. "I honestly don't know…"

Kurogane climbed out of the bag, deathly pale and shaking like a leaf. His eye kept twitching, and he was murmuring things to himself.

Aaya bounced up to him, completely ignoring Sanosuke's warning. "So, how was your punishment, Kuro-Kuro? What'd the principal do to you?"

Kurogane's body spasmed, making his arm hit Aaya in the face. Then he turned to his classmates and said, "It was terrible…So…so much…"

"Blood?" Hatori offered.

"Penth-ouse?" Shigure asked.

"HE HIT ME IN THE EYE!" Ayame exclaimed, coving said eye. Kureno was the only one who noticed/cared.

Kurogane shook his head. "S-so much…PINK!!" then he went into a corner and stayed in the fetal position for the rest of class.

Eventually the class settled back down and took their seats, Kureno surrounded by the other three Sohmas. Class continued on like normal, but with slight confusion whenever Sano-sense called on "Sohma" to answer a question.

With Kureno sitting between them, Ayame and Shigure were unable to get up to their usual antics. Instead, they were both pelting Kureno with questions about why they never saw him except at New Years', and why he didn't go to school, and so on…

Hatori looked at Kureno, then at Ayame and Shigure. Honestly, he was rather (pleasantly) surprised that Kureno seemed to be nothing like the other two. In fact he seemed super shy as he was bombarded by questions.

Sano-sensei suddenly cleared his throat. "Sohma-kun, will you _please_ shut the hell up?"

All four Sohma boys looked at each other and said in unison, "Which one?"

Sensei snapped his chalk in half. "Dammit! You know what I meant, you little snot-nosed brats!"

Kureno cowered in his seat while Gure and Aaya giggled before laying their heads down and taking a nap.

About halfway through the lesson, Shigure woke up. After listening for a few seconds, he became bored beyond belief.

_What to do, what to do…_ Shigure thought, taking out a stick of gum and popping it into his mouth.

Suddenly, an idea came out of nowhere and smacked him in the face!

Quickly taking out a piece of paper, he wrote a note to Aaya, turned it into a paper airplane, put another stick of gum in it, and threw it at Ayame.

Unfortunately, he'd forgotten that Kureno now sat between them, so the airplane crashed into the side of Kureno's head.

Kureno looked down at the plane, which had doodles of people on fire, and opened it with curiosity.

_NOOOO!!_ Shigure screamed in his head. _DON'T OPEN IT, YOU IDIOT!!_

After reading the note, Kureno turned to Shigure, smiled, and said, "Okay!" Then he popped in his stick of gum and began chewing it.

Shigure began to beat his head with his book. Hatori, who happened to be watching from his seat behind Kureno, found this highly entertaining. _No, no, no, no! I can't be a trouble-maker without Aaya! _Shigure thought.

He turned back to Kureno just in time to see the shy boy take out his gum and hurl it all the way across the classroom and into Sanosuke-sensei's spiky hair.

Sano stopped mid-sentence, looked around, then shrugged and went back to teaching.

Shigure gaped at Kureno, then hurriedly took out his gum and held it out to Kureno. "Dude, that was awesome! Do it again!"

Kureno looked slightly disgusted as he took the gum, but chucked it across the room as well. Again it landed in Sano's hair, and again, he didn't notice.

"Dude, this is gonna be totally sweet!!" Shigure said, pulling out 2 more packets of gum.

Hatori dropped his head into his hands. He really felt like sobbing. _No! OH, GOD, NOT ANOTHER IDIOT!! WHAT DID I DO TO DESERVE THIS?!_ He screamed in his head.

--Later--

Ayame had been sleeping for at lease 25 minutes before the screaming started. Yawning and rubbing his eyes, he sat up and looked around. He blinked, then rubbed his eyes and looked again to make sure he was seeing properly.

Sano-sensei's hair was pink from all the gum lodged in it, and random objects (a ruler, a stapler, his hand) were now stuck to his head.

"That was the best! You're the man, Kureno!" Shigure exclaimed, high-fiving Kureno.

Aame gasped in horror as Shigure then hugged Kureno like he was the cure for cancer…or in this case, boredom.

"Tori! Tori! Shigure's— Are you okay?" Aaya asked worriedly when he saw Hatori holding a bloody paper towel against his forehead.

Dazed, Hatori nodded then said, "I just overdid it when I tried bashing my head into the desk."

Aaya blinked before going back to being scandalized. "Hatori! Shigure's acting like he's best friends with Kureno instead of me! He told me he'd never do that with anyone else!"

Hatori blinked slowly and, no doubt due to his temporary brain damage, pointed out, "You know, you make it sound like he's cheating on you."

"Yes, that's it exactly!" Ayame exclaimed. "Thanks, Tori-san!"

Hatori groaned and let his head fall onto the desk.

Ayame turned back to Shigure and Kureno, who were in the process of making a secret handshake. "Shigure, you jerk-face! How dare you cheat on me?!" Ayame shrieked.

The other two boys paused in the middle of their fist bump and stared at Ayame. In fact the entire class stopped what they were doing to turn around and stare at him.

Shigure stared wide-eyed. "Wha…?" Unlike poor Aaya, he actually knew what 'cheating on' someone meant.

"You're cheating on me with Kureno!" Ayame exclaimed, pointing at Kureno

At this, a girl in the back reading Gravitation whipped her head up. "YAOI!!" She squealed before going back to her manga, and eventually passing out from a nosebleed.

All four Sohma boys looked at each other, then turned to Sagara-sensei and asked, "What's yaoi?"

Sano's eye twitched. "Uh…it's um…I'm gonna go get a health teacher!" The he sprinted from the room so fast he left an after-image.

The class then went back to watching the soap opera unfolding between the two Sohma boys.

"Why would you cheat on me, Gure-san? I thought we were best friends!!" Aaya said accusingly.

Shigure left Kureno in mid fist-bump and walked over to the snake. "I'm sorry, Aaya. You were asleep, and Kureno was there, so…I thought 'why not?'"

"…Tori's right, you are a jerk-face," Aaya said, stomping back to his seat and proceeding to shun Shigure.

"What? When'd he say that?" Shigure turned to Hatori, and was surprised to find the dragon passed out, with a trickle of blood leaking from his forehead into a brand-new dent in his desk.

At that moment, Sagara-sensei returned to the class, dragging along the health teacher, Nekozawa-sensei, behind him.

"Okay, kids, I brought Nekozawa-sensei here to explain to you what yaoi is!" Sagara-sensei exclaimed.

Nekozawa glared at them all. "It's when two guys, who may or may not love each other very much, get together, and one guy sticks –beep—beep- up the other's –beep- and they –beeep- each other till they –beeeep-!

All the kids fell silent. Sano stared at Nekozawa, wide-eyed. "If I'd known you were going to corrupt them that bad, I'd have done it myself."

Nekozawa shrugged. "Your fault for tearing me away from Berzenoff." And with that, Nekozawa left.

Sano turned back to all the now-corrupted children. "Well, now that you know, let's get back to the lesson!"

"Um, sensei?" Kureno said, raising his hand. He looked really worried.

"What is it?" Sano-sensei asked.

The whole calls joined Kureno in pointing at Hatori and his bloody desk, and the other two Sohmas, who were poking his unconscious body.

"HOLY FUCKING SHIT!!" Sagara-sensei shouted in shock.

--The Next Day--

Hatori sat silently at his desk, staring at the soft foamy stuff that had been taped to the top of it. Apparently, the teachers were concerned that he would try bashing his brains out again, and that he was a 'troubled' child.

Hatori sighed. It was bad enough his head was bandaged up; now everybody probably thought he was crazy.

You would be, too, if you had my cousins!

"Y'know, Tori-san, I don't think you should do that again," Ayame said from his own seat. "Your head was all bloody and stuff and your dad looked like he had a spaz-attack.

"Yeah, yeah, I won't do it again…plus it gave me a huge headache…" Hatori grumbled.

Then Shigure walked back into class, having gone to the bathroom.

Ayame stood up when he reached them. "You didn't cheat on my while you were away, did you, Gure-san?"

"Of course not, my dear Aaya," Shigure replied with a smile. "No one could compare to you!"

They stared at each other for a few moments, then smiled, gave each other a thumbs-up, and shouted, "ALL RIGHT!"

Again, the girl in the back of the class let out a fangirl shriek, then went back to her latest BL manga.

Hatori sighed and rolled his eyes. He had a feeling his cousins were going to keep up that routine for a loooong, long time to come.


	10. Visits

Chapter 10

Hiko Seijuro, third grade teacher at some elementary in Aizu, was starting to think that taking his class on a field trip was a mistake.

"Hey, Gure-san! Guess what?! This guy just told me that the secret of life lies with the suicide of birds and the singing fishes!!"

Hiko sighed, rubbing his temples to banish the oncoming headache. _God, these kids are worse than my idiot apprentice…_

"That's nothing, Aaya. This lady just told me that guys can have babies and that they steal women's babies and replace them with lizards!"

Hiko-sensei sighed again, louder this time. _I REALLY should have listened to Sanosuke's email about those three…_ he thought.

There was a tug on his sleeve and Hiko-sensei looked down to see Sohma Hatori.

"Yeah, what is it?" he asked.

"Sensei, why are we at an _asylum_…?" Hatori asked.

Yes, for a class trip, Hiko-sensei had taken them to an asylum. But that wasn't exactly what he had told them…

"Sensei, I thought you said we were gonna go to the funny farm?!" a student asked.

"Yeah, where are the animals and the barn and the chickens and the farmer?" another student questioned.

"There isn't even a _dog_, man!" Shigure shouted.

"There are too dogs," Hiko argued. _Or rather, people who think they're dogs…eh, same thing_, he thought.

"In case you all haven't noticed," Hatori said, gesturing around at the hallway they were in. "We're not even at a _farm_."

This fact got all of the class riled up and wondering why sensei would lie about going to a farm, so Hiko-sensei quickly decided to get them all quiet again.

Once the class was silent, Hiko turned on the Sohma boys. "You." He pointed at Hatori. "Shut up and stop turning my idiot students against me." He pointed to Shigure. "You shut up about dogs or I will have you turned into one. And you—" Suddenly, Hiko-sensei realized that Ayame wasn't anywhere to be seen.

"Where's Ayame?" he demanded, glaring at all his students.

"I'm right here!" Aaya sang out, bouncing up next to his cousins. He was eating a lollipop that was a bright, nuclear green.

"Where were you?" Hiko demanded at the same time Shigure jealously asked, "Where'd you get that?"

Ayame laughed. "I wasn't here, obviously," he answered Hiko.

"Tell him, Ayame," Hatori ordered.

"I was wandering around, cause you guys were really boring, and I was falling asleep listening, and I found a clown, and his make up was kinda funny, and he had scars on his face and green hair, and he said that if I let him out, he'd give me this sucker, so I let him out, and he gave me this, and he walked away muttering about getting rid of the bats in his belfry or something, and then I came back over here!" Ayame exclaimed in a asingle breath. "Oh, and he gave me a card, but I threw it away."

Somewhere in the asylum, a trash can blew up…

Hiko growled in frustration before hitting the three Sohmas upside their heads. "Alright, class, gather around and don't wander off. We're going to visit an old student of mine."

One student raised his hand. "What if we have to go pee?"

"Then you'll be walking around in warm, wet underwear the rest of the day."

Hiko led them through a maze of hallways and stairways, the students staring in awe at people who could knit invisible scarves and see in rainbows. Eventually, they reached a bullet-proof steel door with high-tech security and locks, including a fingerprint scanner.

There was a name plate outside of the door with the room number and the name Himura Kenshin.

"All right, kids! Line up single file and go in and say hi to Himura-kun," Hiko-sensei said, somehow opening the door without using the fingerprint scanner.

The kids jostled each other into line, everyone wanting to be the first to see Himura-kun in the hopes that it might be the Himura-san that the Sohmas had told them about. Somehow, Hatori ended up first in line, followed by Ayame and Shigure.

"Why isn't the light on?" Hatori asked, at the same time Shigure exclaimed, "I'm blind! I can't see!"

Ayame held a hand in front of Gure's face, saying, "Can you see my hand in front of your face?"

"…Yes…"

"Then you're not blind."

"Master Hiko?" Himura-kun asked. "Who did you bring with you?"

"Just my students. Now, where's that light switch…?" Hiko-sensei muttered to himself. He wasn't about to get his ass sued off by some parent because he'd tripped over and squished their kid. "Aha! Found it!"

Suddenly the lights flickered on, and many of the students, the trio among them, complained that it burned and began to hiss.

The vampire-like reactions stopped once the kids saw the crazy red-haired guy in the corner, wearing, not one, but _two_ straight jackets.

In true Ayame fashion, Ayame said, "Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Himura-sensei! Why's yer eye twitchin? Why you tryin to grab that sword? Why you glaring?" Why your eyes all gold n stuff? Why—?"

"**AHHHHH**!!" Himura ripped through both straight jackets and ran, screaming down the hallway. "IT SMELLS LIKE **CHICKEN**!!"

Hiko stared wide-eyed after his former apprentice, then back at Ayame. _Wow, I know he's annoying, but that's a bit much…_

Then he heard security coming and remembered that he and his students hadn't actually gotten permission to visit Kenshin in the asylum.

"Okay, kids! Time to learn a very important life skill! It's called 'fleeing the scene of the crime.' Now, out the window!!" Hiko exclaimed, tying up a bed sheet rope and tossing it out the window.

Within a few minutes, everyone was out of the asylum and driving away in the bus they had arrived in.

Once they were about five miles away, Hiko had enough sense to do a head count…and curse when he came up one student short.

"Shitfuckdamn! Hatori! Shigure! Where the hell's Ayame?" Hiko hollered, glaring the fires of hell at the two Sohmas.

"He's…uh…" Hatori began.

"He's riding on top of the bus," Shigure finished.

"Oh," Hiko said, immediately clam. "Well, that's okay then."

So, they went back to school, while Hatori and Shigure high-fived each other and cackled evilly the way back.

--Back at the Asylum--

Doctor MacGovnan and Doctor Sabel stared in confusion at the small child lying on the floor of Himura Kenshin's room.

The child (they thought it was a girl, but then again…) had been wrapped up in a ripped-up straight jacket and had a note on his forehead that said, "Hello, my name is Ayame and I need some serious mental help."

Doctor MacGovnan looked at Doctor Sabel and shrugged, and then they both picked him up and took him to an empty room. Then they started filling out the paperwork to admit Ayame into their wonderful asylum.

Two days later, there was a giant explosion and the asylum burnt to the ground, and Ayame went back home.


	11. Candy Canes

Chapter 11

"Hey, guys! Look what I brought!" Ayame pulled a handful of candy canes out of…somewhere.

Shigure blinked. "Is…is that a purse?"

"No!" Ayame proclaimed defensively. "It's a…a…a bag of holding!" He sort of hid the bag behind him as he said this.

"Sure," Shigure said. "You just keep telling yourself that…"

Hatori reached behind the snake and pulled the purse out. It was overflowing with candy canes of every shape, size, and color.

"Why do you have this many candy canes? You mug an elf?"

Ayame shook his head. "Of course not! Then I wouldn't get any presents!" He gave a couple to Hatori and Shigure. "My mom bought too many, so I'm just giving the whole class some."

After leaving about a dozen candy canes on his desk, Aaya went off to give everyone in the classroom candy canes. Once all the other kids were eating their candy, Ayame went up to their fourth grade teacher, Saito's, desk.

"Hey, Saito-sensei?" Ayame said.

Saito Hajime stopped reading his newspaper and glared down at the boy, all while smoking his cigarette.

"What?"

"Have a candy cane!" Aaya grabbed his teacher's hand and put a red candy cane in it.

Saito-sensei glared at the piece of candy before breaking it in half and tossing it tin the trash can beside his desk. "Get back in your seat, Sohma."

Ayame ran back to this seat, tears in his eyes. "T-Tori-chan!!"

Hatori looked at Aaya and raised an eyebrow, still sucking on his candy cane.

"Saito-sensei broke the candy cane I gave him and threw it away! Now Santa will never give me my presents!" Here, Ayame broke down crying.

"It's okay, Aaya. Just sneak one onto his desk later while he's not looking. Then Santa will give you all the presents you want!" Shigure said, giving Aaya a hug. He turned to look at Hatori. "Right, Haa-san?"

Hatori kept sucking on his candy cane for a couple seconds before taking it out and asking, "Who's Santa?"

Shigure, Ayame, and a few nearby classmates stopped what they were doing and stared at the dragon.

"Seriously?" Shigure asked. Hatori nodded sucking on his candy cane.

"Wow…your parents never told you about Santa Claus?" A student asked. Hatori shook his head.

"That's it! You and Gure-chan are going to come to my house and sleep over Christmas Eve!" Ayame declared, glomping both his cousins. "I'm gonna introduce you to Santa!"

"Great…" Hatori muttered.

"Everyone, get to your seats and take out your notebooks." Saito-sensei said suddenly. He went to the chalkboard and began writing things down. "We're going to be learning about the Shinsengumi today."

The class groaned in unison and did what the sensei told them. After about ten minutes, while Saito rattled off important names and dates, Ayame began sneaking over to Saito's desk with a giant plastic candy cane filled with Hershey's Kisses.

Shigure leaned over to Hatori. "Where'd he get that thing…?"

"We probably don't want to know…" Hatori answered.

Ayame, returning to his seat and hearing his cousins, said, "From my Magic Bag of Wonders!"

Hatori and Shigure, finding no response to this statement, decided to ignore it and return their attention to the sensei.

Saito finished writing his notes on the the board and turned around tith a sadistic grin on his face. "Now…POP QUIZ!!"

Silence.

"What? No groans?" Saito-sensei was used to teaching slightly older children that complained quite loudly whenever the words 'pop' and 'quiz' were used in the same sentence. Yes. The sentence, 'I once had a quiz about popcorn,' makes students whine.

One brave (or stupid) student raised his hand and attempted to speak around his candy cane. "Wha's a pop quiz?"

Saito blinked at the kid's stupidity. Then he decided to end it. He grabbed the longest thing on his desk - the candy cane - and took up a Gatotsu stance. "Baka. Soku. Zan." He charged the student.

Unfortunately, he forgot about Ayame's 'Magic Bag of Wonders.' Saito-sensei tripped over the bag and went flying, ending up with the candy cane crushed beneath himself.

"NOOOOOOoo….." Ayame mourned the crushed candy cane. "The candy cane…it was too young to die…No…"

Saito-sensei pushed himself up into a sitting position, looking around for what he had tripped over. If looks were deadly, Ayame's bag would have spontaneously combusted.

Raising his gaze higher, Saito glared daggers at the silver-haired Sohma boy. Ayame shook in terror.

"I'm going to kill you with…" Pausing, he took Shigure's candy cane from his mouth, revealing it to be quite pointy and sharp. "With this candy cane!!"

"AAAHH!!" Ayame screamed as his sensei walked slowly toward him, candy cane raised.

Suddenly, the door was busted in and ten armed S.W.A.T members ran in.

"FREEZE!" They shouted.

Saito-sensei sighed, dropping the candy and raising his arms above his head. "Not this again…"

"Saito Hajime, you are wanted for the murder of Mr. L. Mow and Mr. G. Oofy!" The officer looked at Ayame, then the candy candy cane, then back to Saito. "And now the attempted murder of a fourth grader!!"

Saito sighed again as they handcuffed him. "Well, it looks like class is dismissed early today. Everyone get the hell home."

As the children cheered happily and began to leave, Saito shouted after them, "But there will be a quiz tomorrow!"

The students groaned.

"So…" Shigure started as the trio walked home, "we're staying at Aaya's for Christmas?"

Before Hatori could say anything, Ayame burst out, "Yeah! You have to come, or else, Tori-san will never meet Santa or get presents!!"

Hatori looked between Ayame and Shigure's expectant faces and decided there was no use fighting his cousins.

Fine, fine. I'll come for Christmas."

"Yaay!" Aaya and Gure exclaimed.

"Just you wait, this'll be the best Christmas ever!!" Shigure promised as Ayame caught him and Hatori in a hug.


	12. Santa?

Disclaimer: Completely forgot about this last chapter, but oh, well....by now if you haven't figured out that we don't own the rights to Fruits Basket, or anything else you might recognize, you need more help than Kenshin.

Chapter 12

"Hatori, unlock this door, right now!" Dr. Sohma shouted, pounding on his son's door.

"No!" came the reply. "I'm not going, and you can't make me!"

Dr. Sohma sighed. "Open the door. You're going to be late for your sleepover."

"I'm not spending the entire night with those two idiots!" Hatori shouted.

Dr. Sohma resisted the urge to get a gun. "Hatori, be reasonable. If you don't go, Shigure and Ayame will bug you about it for the rest of your life, and you'll never hear the end of it."

_And neither will I…_ Dr. Sohma thought gloomily.

Suddenly there was a click and the door opened to reveal Hatori, dressed and carrying a sleeping bag and an oversized duffel bag.

"Let's go."

----------

Ayame paced back and forth in front of the front door, chewing his thumb. "Where's Tori-san? He should've been here by now!!" he whined, stomping his feet in frustration. He ran back to the couch where Shigure was sitting, grabbing a pillow and clutching it like a life line.

Shigure sighed, staring at the now-crying snake. "Aaya, calm down! He's only…" Shigure checked the clock on the wall "…two minutes late!"

"Because he's not coming!" Ayame wailed.

Shigure patted him on the head. "It's okay, Haa-san is going to come any second now, you'll see."

Ayame opened his mouth to tell Shigure to stop lying, when suddenly there was a knock on the door. Ayame gasped, grinning from ear to ear. "Hatori!!"

Shigure blinked in surprise. _Huh_, he thought. _I'm psychic!_

Ayame skipped giddily to the door, grinning like an addict who just got free crack. He opened the door, shouting, "Tori's here! Tori's here!"

A teenager holding a pizza box stared down at the little boy.

Ayame looked around the pizza delivery boy. "Tori?" He opened the box in the boy's hands. "Tori-san?" He gave one last-ditch attempt to find Tori under the welcome mat before he went wailing down the hallway, nearly knocking over his father, who was coming to pay for the pizza. "HE HATES US!! WAAAH!!!"

Hatori, who was sitting on the couch next to Shigure, leaned toward the dog and said, "Wow, I didn't know he hated pizza that much."

Shigure did a double-take. "Wait. When? How? Huh?"

"Ten seconds ago, and I walked through the front door."

Ayame, who had completely frozen when he heard Tori's voice, came sprinting into the room, aimed himself at Hatori and launched. Hatori saw him coming and ducked off the couch at the last second.

Ayame hit the back of the couch, knocking it, and Shigure, over. They went sprawling. Hatori stood up and looked over the couch.

Shigure and Ayame stared up at the dragon as he seemed to have convulsions. When a squeaky sort of sound started to accompany the convulsions, Ayame turned to Shigure and asked, "Is Tori-san gonna be okay?"

"I think so. I think he's laughing," Shigure replied without taking his eyes off of his possibly-unstable cousin.

"It's kind of weird…" Ayame muttered, staring up at Hatori, who was beginning to attempt to compose himself.

"I think that's just because he doesn't do it often," Shigure explained, pulling himself and Ayame up.

Ayame cocked his head, eyes flicking between Hatori and a tray of gingerbread cookies on the table in front of the television. "You think if we get him hyper enough, he'll laugh more?"

"It's worth a shot."

By then, Hatori had pulled himself together and was currently staring at his cousins questioningly, still smiling. "What were you guys talking about?"

"We're hungry," Shigure said at the same time Ayame asked, "Do you want a cookie?"

"What?"

"Do you want a cookie?" Shigure asked as Ayame said, "We're hungry." They glared at each other.

"Still didn't get it," Hatori said.

Shigure put his hand over Ayame's mouth and repeated, "Do you want a cookie?" He used his free hand to point at the gingerbread cookies.

"Oh." Hatori thought for a second. "Then what did he say?" He gestured toward Ayame.

Ayame bit Shigure's hand. While he was muttering fourth-grade curses, Ayame said, "We're hungry. Do you want a cookie?"

"Oh." Another pause. "Okay." Hatori went over to the cookies, grabbed one, and bit its head off. He blinked. "Hey, these are good." He grabbed five more and went to the couch, shoveling the cookies into his mouth.

Ayame looked at Shigure worriedly. "I have a bad feeling about this…"

"Nonsense, Aaya! This is gonna be great, just you wait and see!" Shigure said confidently.

---15 minutes later---

"Crap! Run, Aaya, run!" Shigure shouted, running back toward the house. They had run outside in the first place because Hatori had started a pillow fight, which escalated into a snowball war when the hyper dragon had followed them outside. At some point, while he was pelting Ayame and Shigure with snow, he'd lost his shirt…non of them were quite sure how or why…

Now, after being soaked with snow, Shigure and Ayame retreated back into the relative safety of the house.

Hatori came in a couple of minutes later, bouncing excitedly. "Hey, guys! Look what I did!! I made a snow-dragon!" He pointed out the door.

The other two looked and stared.

"…Why did he make a seahorse…?" Shigure asked curiously.

"I think he broke his head," Ayame guessed. "It's all your fault, Gure."

"What?!" Shigure exclaimed. "This is your fault, too!!"

"No, it's not!"

"Yes, it is!"

"No, it's --"

"ACHOO!!!"

Ayame and Shigure stopped arguing and looked to see Hatori sitting on the couch, shivering and looking like his normal self again.

He grabbed a tissue and blew his nose, then looked at his cousins. "Where's my shirt?" he questioned.

The other two shrugged.

"Okay…then why are all the pillows torn up and why are you two covered in snow?" Hatori asked.

"That would be your fault," Shigure answered.

"Huh?"

"You got hyper from the cookies and went crazy and threw snowballs at us," Ayame explained.

"Oh…that would explain why I'm so tired…" Hatori said, yawning a bit.

Shigure yawned, too. "Yeah, let's just go to bed, now."

Ayame bounced up and down. "Yeah, and in the morning we can open our presents from Santa!!"

----------

Surprisingly enough, Hatori was not the first to fall asleep. Ayame was. Hatori couldn't fall asleep because of Shigure barking in his sleep.

They had moved down the hall to Ayame's room, so "Santa wouldn't see them," according to Ayame.

Hatori had been laying there, staring at the ceiling and listening to Shigure's snore-barking, when suddenly, he really had to go the bathroom. He got up, went to the bathroom, and on the way back decided to see if this "Santa" person had showed up yet.

What he saw when he looked into the living room was some man in a red suit holding presents that Hatori would swear had meen under the tree earlier that day.

With all the bluntness of a nine-year-old, he asked, "Why are you stealing Ayame's presents?"

The man, who up to that point hadn't noticed the boy, turned around with a yelp, dropping the present he was holding. Upon seeing the kid, he let out a sigh of relief. "You must be one of Ayame-chan's friends. Why don't you go on back to bed, now, okay?"

"You didn't answer my question," Hatori pointed out as he started slowly moving toward the side-table that had the phone.

"Question?…Oh!" The man was slightly flustered. He hadn't had to play Santa since Ayame was five and got told off for being awake when Santa showed up. "I'm not stealing presents! I'm putting them under the tree!"

"But that one was already under the tree." Hatori was almost within arm's reach of the phone. Just a few more steps…

As the kid reached for the phone, the man finally realized what he was going to do. "Shit!" He moved to know the phone out of the boy's hand, but ended up tripping over the present he had dropped earlier and hitting his head, rather hard, against the floor.

"Hello, 911?" Hatori said into the phone. "There's some man stealing all our presents…Yeah….No, I'm at my cousin's house…I got up 'cause I had to pee and saw him in the living room holding Ayame's presents…"

The man, still slightly stunned by his fall, reached for the boy from his sprawled position on the floor. He was having trouble getting up because his legs were tangled up with the present.

Hatori was giving the nice lady the address of Ayame's parent's house when he noticed the man reaching for him. "Now, he's trying to grab me!!!"

"No, I'm not! Just be quiet and give me the phone so that I can explain what's going on!" the man said, reaching for the phone. "Seriously, who the hell calls the cops on Santa?!"

"Get away from me!!" Hatori shouted, swinging the phone at the stranger. It was then he saw Shigure stumble sleepily into the room.

"Hey, wha's goin' on…" Shigure asked with a yawn.

Hatori pointed at the man. "He's stealing Ayame's presents!"

Shigure took one look at the man before screaming, "IT'S THE GRINCH!!" and grabbing a pillow and throwing it at the man's head.

"I am not the - OW!! What the--?! The man turned to see what had hit him. It was the phone, and the 911 lady was still talking.

The man growled, then reached down and picked up Shigure and Hatori by their shirts. They began to kick and try to twist out of the man's grasp, but it was no use.

"Will you two please just shut up and --" The man was cut off because at that moment, the front door was broken down by the police. A half dozen officers stormed into the living room and leveled their pistols at the fake Santa.

"Um…" the man said, "This isn't what it looks like…?"

The policemen rushed him and soon Shigure and Hatori were sitting on the couch while the man in the Santa outfit was handcuffed. "Okay, let's see what kind of sick bastard steals presents from children!" One officer said, ripping off the stranger's fake white beard.

Hatori blinked, then turned to look at Shigure, whose mouth was hanging open. "Is…Is that Ayame's dad?"

"Aaya's dad is Santa Claus…?" Shigure asked in disbelief. "No fair!!"

Mr. Sohma glared at the boys as the police apologized and uncuffed him. "No, I am not Santa Claus!"

"Huh? But you have the suit and everything!" Shigure exclaimed, gesturing wildly at said suit.

Mr. Sohma sighed, then sat down on the couch next to the young boys. "Listen, I hate to tell you this, but…there is no such thing as Santa Claus." At Shigure's horrified look, Mr. Sohma continued, "It's really just parents getting up in the middle of the night and putting more presents under the tree for their kids. Now…" He got out two twenty-dollar bills and gave one to each of the boys. "go back to sleep and don't tell Ayame about the Santa thing or his mom'll kill me."

Hatori, slightly disappointed there was no Santa, led a stunned Shigure back to Ayame's room. Aaya was still dead asleep in his bed. "How did he sleep through all of this?" Hatori wondered aloud.

"I say we tell him there's no Santa," Shigure said bitterly.

"Ah, let him think he's real for another year or so. Then you can scar him for life," Hatori said.

---the next morning---

Ayame woke his cousins up bright and early so they could go open up the presents that "Santa" had left for them. Ayame had gotten a new bag, a stuffed pony, new clothes, and a train set. Hatori's gift was a play-doctor kit, and Shigure had gotten a stack of comics.

As Shigure read his comics, Hatori happened to look over and see Ayame staring sulkily at his presents. "What's wrong? Didn't you get what you wanted?"

"Not everything." Ayame pulled out a list from nowhere and handed it to Hatori.

"A pony, a new bag, a dog, a dragon, an elf, and…a baby brother?" Hatori read aloud.

"What're you gonna do with a baby brother?" Shigure asked, not even bothering to look up from his comic.

"I dunno." Ayame shrugged. "I just thought it'd be kinda fun."

Before either Hatori or Shigure could make a comment, Ayame's mother ran crying and laughing happily from the bathroom.

"Honey?! Honey! We're pregnant!!"

All three children were silent as Mrs. Sohma ran from the room to find her sleeping husband. Finally, after five minutes of silence, Ayame jumped up and started dancing.

"Yes!!!"


	13. TO THE AQUARIUM!

Disclaimer: So sick of this part of the story, so... Random things that were written down the margins of the notebook: 'Real men wear kilts. Brightly colored ones that keep our attention.' 'Once upon a time, there was a happy little unicorn and the happy little unicorn lived in happy little unicorn land.' And 'Note to self: Never watch DBZ Abridged before writing in this notebook... GAAAAHHHH!!! XD

Chapter 13

TO THE AQUARIUM!!!

"Tori-san?" Ayame looked at his friend worriedly. When he got no response, he turned to Shigure and cried, "Gure-san! Tori-san looks dead and he's not talking! I thing he might actually be dead! D-E-D, DED!!"

Shigure looked at the dragon. "He does look dead…" He poked Hatori in the side, earning himself a (very weak) slap to the face. "OH MY GOD, HE'S A ZOMBIE!!"

Megumi-sensei walked over the trio to remind them that an aquarium is a public place, so don't make a scene, when she was attacked by Ayame and Shigure. They were trying to hide behind her, but not having much luck because there was only enough room for one ten-year-old.

"HE'S GONNA EAT OUR BRAINS!!" Ayame shrieked as he pushed Shigure out from behind Takani-sensei's skirt.

"BUT I LIKE MY BRAIN!" Shigure yelled, trying to shove his way back behind Takani-sensei.

"WILL YOU TWO SHUT UP ALREADY!" Megumi yelled, bashing the two ten-year-olds' heads together. "Hatori-kun is just sick, okay? Let me give him some medicine, and he'll be just fine." She pulled her medicine box out from under her skirt and rifled through it until she found a bottle of purple gooey stuff. She poured some onto a spoon and handed it to Hatori. "Swallow this, and you'll feel all better!"

Hatori sniffed at it suspiciously before he decided that any side effects of the medicine couldn't be worse than how he felt being sick. He swallowed the spoonful in one big gulp.

Ayame and Shigure stared at him as if they expected him to change colors or something.

Satisfied that her student looked at least somewhat better, Takani-sensei turned to the rest of the students, who had been staring in awe of the giant blue whale on the ceiling, and said, "Meet back here in two hours! If you're not here by then, you get left behind!" She caught sight of Sano-sensei walking around, holding his bloody, beat-up-looking hand. "SANO!!"

Sanosuke ran into the darkest exhibit he saw, but Megumi still managed to chase after him and tackle him.

The students scattered in about eight different directions. All except for the Mabudachi Trio. Ayame and Shigure were still staring at Hatori, who hadn't moved since taking the medicine.

Ayame poked Hatori. "Gure-san, I don't think the medicine worked right…"

Hatori fell over, completely still until he hit the ground. As his head made contact with the hard ground, there was a poof of grey smoke, and poor Hatori had become a sea horse.

When the smoke had cleared enough for Aaya and Gure to see their cousin, they weren't quite sure what to think.

"I thought Hatori was the dragon…" Ayame said.

Shigure tilted his head to the side in confusion. "So did I. Why's he like that?" Ayame only shrugged in response. The stood there like that, staring down at Hatori's sea horse from, before Shigure spoke again.

"Hey, doesn't he need to be in water?"

Both Sohmas were quiet for a few seconds before screaming in panic, picking up Hatori and running around to look for a tank to put their friend in.

"Crap! Does he go in salt water or fresh water?!" Shigure asked, looking wildly around.

"Put him in that one!" Ayame exclaimed, pointing to a tank that didn't have floor-to-ceiling glass.

Without hesitation, Shigure tossed Hatori through the space between the top of the glass and the ceiling and into the tank. Heaving sighs of relief, Shigure and Ayame looked at the display thing next to the tank that told what kind of fish were in the tank and some interesting facts about them.

"Hey, Gure-san!" Ayame shouted. "There are sea snakes in here! I wonder if there's a sea dog. . .OH! Hey, there's a starfish, too! And a Jellyfish, and a sea otter, and a hammerhead shark, and a sea bass and a clownfish, and an angelfish!!"

Shigure watched as the sea horse Tori woke up and swam around confusedly. The action attracted the attention of some of the sea snakes, who had been lazily drifting around where Tori had landed.

Cautiously, the snakes swam over to the sea horse, curious about a creature they had never seen before. One albino snake in particular took a liking to Tori and wrapped itself around Tori in a suffocating hug.

"Yay! They're getting along!" Ayame exclaimed happily, pointing at the two.

A passing aquarium employee happened to look up as Ayame said this and started freaking out about the sea horse in the wrong tank. She pulled out a walkie-talkie and screamed into it, "We have a Code Orange in the Hammerhead Tank. I need a net, a holding tank, and sea horse food in the room behind the Hammerhead Tank. Over."

"We don't have a Code Orange…but I can get the tank, net, and food in about three minutes," came the response from the walkie-talkie.

The woman with the walkie-talkie went through a door next to the tank.

"Umm… Aaya?" Shigure tapped Ayame's shoulder as he danced in a circle around the dog.

"What?"

Without a word, Shigure pointed at the doo that had opened above and to the side of the tank that they had tossed Hatori into. The woman from before was standing there, holding a net and trying to coax the albino sea snake off the sea horse… with very little success. Eventually, she gave up trying to separate the two and just pulled both the sea horse and snake out of the tank with the net. "Gotcha."

"Noooo…!" Ayame cried as she turned and took Hatori with her into the back room.

--------IN THE BACKROOM-------

Hatori and his new 'friend' were put in a small portable tank that was full of saltwater. "You two just wait here while I figure out what I'm supposed to do with you," said the woman as she turned and walked out of the room into what was probably a hallway, but Hatori couldn't really tell.

_Thank God, she's gone!_ Hatori thought. He knew he'd be changing back any second, so he tried to get as close as possible to the top of the tank.

He was right. The instant his nose breached the surface of the water, he puffed back to his human state. Unfortunately, he had the sea snake wrapped around his neck and it was freaking out at his sudden change and constricting his air supply.

Shigure stuck his head around the door just as Hatori fell over with his hands still clutching at the snake. "Ayame…I think we're too late…" Shigure said to the Snake, who was peering over his shoulder.

"Noooo!!" Ayame screamed. Again. He pushed Shigure out of the way and ran into the room and threw himself on his fallen comrade. Unfortunately for Hatori's mental state, Aaya was missing a few things…like clothes.

The snake didn't care that Ayame was naked. As soon as Ayame was close enough, the sea snake slithered onto him, releasing Hatori.

With a gasp, Hatori's hands stopped twitching and his face started to regain normal coloring. He quickly realized that there was a naked Ayame clinging to him and tried to scoot backward out from beneath his naked cousin. His attempts ended when he ran into Shigure's legs. As she turned to look at the Dog, Gure slowly lowered his pants (his shirt already lay in a heap behind him), then put his hands on his hips, stared off into the distance and whispered, "Yes…"

"What the crap?!" Hatori yelped. "Why are you naked?"

"Because you're naked!" Ayame answered. He was now standing with the snake draped across his shoulders and his hands clasped in front of his…well, his [censored].

Hatori blinked. There was no appropriate response to his cousin's blunt statement, so he changed subjects, slightly. "Where are my clothes?"

Shigure shrugged. "They're somewhere in the aquarium. Not quite sure where…."

Hatori sighed, dropping his head into his hands. Why, _why_ did this kind of thing always happen to him? Did he murder someone in a past life or something? "Alright, one of you put your clothes back on and go find my – "

"Never fear, Tori-san! We'll find your clothes in no time flat!" Ayame interrupted, grabbing one of his hands. He then began trying to pull Hatori out the door and into the main part of the aquarium with him.

"Wait a sec – "

Nonsense! We have to find your clothes! We can't waste a second, Shigure exclaimed, grinning from ear to ear. He grabbed Hatori's other hand and, with one forceful tug, pulled Hatori out of the backroom with him and Ayame. All three of them in their birthday suits.

As they stepped out into the hallway, Hatori let out a sigh of relief. They were still in the behind-the-scenes part of the aquarium, so no one was in that particular hallway. Unfortunately, Shigure and Ayame were quickly making their way towards the public aquarium, dragging poor Hatori with them.

As the passed through the door, Hatori finally managed to find a way to stop their progress; he hooked his foot around the corner of the doorjamb. This worked for a few seconds, but the door was very heave, so it closed very quickly. On Hatori's foot.

Until that moment, the trio had gone unnoticed by the crowd of people, but when Hatori yelped in pain because his bare foot was squished in the door, they became the center of attention.

"Oh, my! Those children are naked!"

"Cover your eyes, sweetie…"

"Hurry, take a picture! Take a picture!"

"Children these days…"

"Damn nudists!"

Two goth girls sat nearby, watching the commotion with mild interest. Suddenly, one turned and smacked the other in the head.

"Ouch! What was that for?" The girl who got his exclaimed.

"Why didn't you tell me the Yaoi Scouts were in town?" The first girl yelled.

Shigure and Ayame were loving the attention. In fact, they had begun posing once they had noticed that people were taking pictures. Hatori, on the other hand, was embarrassed beyond belief, his face aflame as he tried to cover himself from the cameras.

"Sohma?! Oh, my god!" A voice came from somewhere to the side of them.

Turning to look, the three Sohma boys say Megumi-sensei pushing her way to the front of the crowd, Sano-sensei and the other students in tow.

"What the hell is wrong with you kids?" Megumi-sensei hissed once she had gotten close enough. She quickly took off her jacket and threw it to Hatori, before ripping off Sano-sensei's much larger jacket and giving it to Shigure and Ayame. "Cover yourselves up and get back to the bus with the rest of the class! Sanosuke, make sure they don't try to run off."

Sanosuke-sensei saluted her before tossing all three Sohmas onto his two shoulders and guiding the rest of the class back to the bus, while Megumi stayed behind to apologize to the owners of the aquarium.

After ten minutes and a phone call to the principal, the bus was headed back to the school. The other kids spent most of their time laughing and teasing the three almost-naked Sohmas. The trio just ignored them.

"C'mon, Tori-san! Tell us why you didn't turn into a dragon!" Ayame demanded, jabbing Hatori in the side with a pencil.

"Yeah, what was up with that?" Shigure asked, ignoring the uncomfortable look on Hatori's face. "I mean, we've never seen your dragon form before, and then you go and turn into a _seahorse_?"

Hatori was quiet as his two cousins eyed him expectantly. Eventually, he decided his excuse would be, "If I'm sick when I transform, I turn into a seahorse."

The other two stared silently before exclaiming in unison, "That's totally awesome!"

"I wonder if I turn into something else when I'm sick, too?" Ayame wondered aloud. "Like a lizard or something."

"And maybe I turn into a wolf!" Shigure said, letting out a fake growl.

Hatori sighed in relief as his cousins chattered on. _Thank god they believed that…I really don't want to be made fun of the rest of my life._

He paused in his thoughts as the bus stopped in front of the school. What he saw surprised and worried him.

Standing in front of the school gate were their parents. Ayame's mother was angrily pacing around, her face absolutely livid, while Ayame's father held his little brother, Yuki, in a baby carrier. Hatori's father wasn't as bad as Aaya's mom, but his face was still angry. Shigure's father was there as well, but he didn't seem all that angry. In fact, he just seemed unsurprised, and bored, if anything.

"This can't be good…" Hatori muttered as the bus stopped.

"On the bright side," Ayame smiled, "You aren't being punished alone" That made the other two smile as well.

"Besides," Shigure added, "What are they going to do? Give us detention for a week? It's not like they're going to expel us or anything."

A/N: For those wondering, Yaoi Scouts is like Boy Scouts, only y'know....and no, it doesn't really exist. We think. Also, the next chapter will be the last one for this story! But don't worry, we're just getting a new title/story for junior high school!


	14. Epilogue

Disclaimer: Once upon a time there was a happy little unicorn, and the happy little unicorn lived in happylittleunicornland because he knew that we did not own any of the characters mentioned in this story.

Epilogue

"Tori-san! Tori-san!" Ayame came bounding into the classroom, waving a small slip of paper. "I got a letter from – oh…"

Hatori and Shigure held up identical slips of paper.

"I guess he wants to see all of us together," Hatori said. "I wonder if this is about the thing at the aquarium last month."

"Maybe they finally figured out what to do with us," Shigure suggested.

"Maybe they're gonna congratulate us on our daring rescue and escape from the back of the aquarium!" Ayame exclaimed.

"No." For once, Hatori and Shigure agreed on something.

"Awww…but – "

"No," Hatori repeated. "Let's just go get this over with." He walked out of the classroom, Shigure and Ayame in tow.

"Party pooper," Ayame muttered as he followed Hatori to Principal Creed's office.

When they finally got to the office, Vice Principal Shiki was waiting for them. He had his arms crossed over his chest and was glaring at the Sohma boys for all he was worth. "Principal Creed is waiting for you…" He said coldly, pointing toward a big, menacing steel door labeled as Creed's office at the back of the room.

The three boys approached the door cautiously, wondering what was in store for them. When Hatori turned the knob and opened the door, the trio blinked in surprise. Their parents were already seated in front of Creed's desk, their faces showing varying degrees of anger and disappointment.

Ayame let out a happy cry and ran over to his baby brother, who was being held by his father, while his mother fumed silently in her seat. Aaya made a face at baby Yuki and the child giggled.

Shigure went to his mom and dad, who looked embarrassed and uncaring, respectively. Hatori sat next to his father quietly, a feeling of dread settling in his stomach.

"I'm sure you're wondering why you all are here…" Creed said from his plush black leather chair. There was a black cat sitting in his lap that he was petting. No one was sure why or where it had come from.

"One month ago," Creed began," your sons went running about in the nude during a field trip to the aquarium. Now, we've all been trying to figure out a suitable punishment for the boys, and since all of my ideas were shot down-" here, Creed pouted sulkily, "-the school board has decided to go with Vice Principal Shiki's plan.

Starting right now, your sons are expelled from this school!!" Creed announced in a theatrical voice.

There was a brief moment of silence as everyone absorbed what had just been said. Ayame's father could feel his wife's temperature quickly rising and decided to save the poor baby by adding more space between the furious Mrs. Sohma and little Yuki. He even began a mental countdown based on the color of his wife's face.

Pink – 3.

Red – 2.

Purple – 1.

Explode.

"HOW THE HELL DO YOU GET EXPELLED FROM ELEMENTARY SCHOOL?!"

Poor Ayame's father had moved the wrong way. It was Hatori's father that had blown up; Ayame's mother seemed content to hold on to her fury until they were at home.

Creed's expression never changed. "By running around a public aquarium in your birthday suit."

As if she had been expecting something worse, Shigure's mom let out a sigh of relief. "So they're just expelled; that's it?"

"Yep!"

She turned to her husband. "I told you it couldn't last. He went through four preschools and you thought he would go through all his schooling in the same place." Shigure's dad just shrugged, still uncaring.

"At least you already have all the paperwork for other schools filled out."

Ayame's dad perked up. "Can I get a copy of that paperwork?"

Hatori's dad was flabbergasted by the other parents' blasé attitude. "Your children just got expelled from elementary school, and all you're worried about is the paperwork to get them into another one?"

"This is nothing new for us," Shigure's mom explained, still very calm. "Shigure went through four preschools; Ayame went through five."

"Only because the last one Ayame went to wouldn't accept Shigure," Shigure's father added. "His reputation was kind of well-known by then."

"Yes, if they had let him attend, he and Ayame would be even," Shigure's mom said.

Hatori looked at his cousins. "What is wrong with you two? Who gets kicked out of FIVE schools?"

"Actually, he only got kicked out of four," Ayame said smuggle, giving Shigure a glance.

Shigure hit him in the shoulder. "Quit bragging!"

Hatori dropped his head into his hands, mentally giving up on this whole situation.

Dr. Sohma could only gape in disbelief at how everyone was treating this situation. The only one who was having a normal reaction was Ayame's mother, who was beginning to lose her control and shake with rage.

"Aren't you even going to punish your children? Aren't you the least bit embarrassed?" Dr. Sohma asked Shigure's parents and Ayame's father.

Shigure's dad shrugged. "What's the point? Punishment hasn't ever really worked on Shigure. He'll just find some other way to get into trouble."

"What about you?" Dr. Sohma asked Ayame's dad.

"Oh, my wife will probably deal with Ayame once we get home," he answered nonchalantly, bouncing baby Yuki up and down on his knee.

"No, I'm not." Ayame's mother suddenly spoke up. "I don't care what he does anymore. He's nothing buy a disappointment."

"Now, dear, don't be so harsh…" Ayame's father said pleadingly.

"No, I've made up my mind. I'm going to make sure that Yuki doesn't end up like his fool of a brother," Ayame's mother said with finality before she took Yuji and promptly left.

Everyone was quiet while Ayame stared after his mother in confusion. "What was mom talking about, Dad?" He asked as he tugged on his father's shirt sleeve.

While Ayame's father tried to think of a lie to tell his son, Shigure's mother cleared her throat and faced Dr. Sohma. "So, would you like a copy of the forms for the new school, too?"

Dr. Sohma was silent for a few moments, turning it over."

"Well, now that that's all decided," Principal Creed spoke up suddenly. He pointed toward the door. "Get the hell out."

A/N: Well, this chapter of the Mabudachi's lives is over. Now on to middle school!! Look out for our next story, which will probably be called something like 'The Purple Years'. If you have any characters (from any fandom) that you would like to see anywhere in the story, leave us a little note in your review. We already have the homeroom teachers picked, but we need a few students and elective teachers. See you in the Purple Years!!


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